


Vows

by les Amis DCD (AlmostARealHobbit)



Series: vow after vow, day after day [1]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Established Relationship, Fluff, Immortal Husbands Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, M/M, Married Couple, Post-Canon, SO MUCH FLUFF, So Married, also Booker isn't here and I'm sorry about it but it's post canon, and I mean it they're HUSBANDS, if you try hard enough sex can be a wedding ceremony, immortal family fluff, you can pry the found family trope from my cold dead hands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:01:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25716229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlmostARealHobbit/pseuds/les%20Amis%20DCD
Summary: “Did you marry when it was made legal?”Joe and Andy snort while Nicky smiles warmly, and just this side of patronising; it is the sort of smile a parent gives their child after a particularly naive yet endearing question.“As if I’d wait for it to be legal to claim this man as mine.”The weddings Nicky and Joe talk about and the ones they keep to themselves.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: vow after vow, day after day [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1905343
Comments: 108
Kudos: 663





	Vows

**Author's Note:**

> Can you believe these two invented love? 
> 
> Loads of thanks to [Melissa](https://al-kaysani.tumblr.com) and [Socialfailure](https://socialfailure.tumblr.com) for beta'ing this fic!

They’re lying low in Brittany, just off the road of a tiny village that ends in sharp cliffs and a breathtaking view of the ocean. This isn’t one of Andy’s safe houses: she doesn’t know the area that well, but Nicky and Joe lived there a long time ago. The house they occupied then has long fallen to ruin, and the people they knew are long gone, as are their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. There’s nothing and no one to welcome them anymore, but they both seem to keep a fondness for the place that Nile doesn’t understand. 

The weather is almost perpetually grey. When it’s not raining, the fog is so thick it threatens to swallow them, the grey stoned houses and the ocean whole. It does nothing to help Andy and Nile’s mood, along with the constant reminders of Booker while they linger in his home country. Joe and Nicky, however, don’t only seem at peace with their rainy haven, but also and mostly glad. They must have been very happy here in the past, because they take long walks together, disappearing for hours and returning giddy, laughing, eyes sparkling bright, full of mirth and love. They also seem closer. They’re always close and open about their affection, but here, in the middle of nowhere, they seem attached at the hip more than ever. Joe’s hands, if they’re not holding Nicky’s, are resting somewhere on Nicky’s back, waist, shoulder or backside, while Nicky generously bestows pecks on Joe’s bearded cheeks, forehead, or collarbone. They kiss too, chaste and obscene, extensively. They wrap all over the other’s back, sit in each other’s lap, and generally move as one, always smiling at their own easy flirting and teasing.

Their lightness almost seems out of place but neither Nile nor Andy have it in themselves to bring them back to Earth and burst their bubble. It is not Joe or Nicky’s fault that they don’t have such a love themselves. And besides, it’s hard not to  _ fall in love _ with their love, still fresh, new and exciting as much as it is familiar, deeply rooted and all-encompassing. 

In this pocket of peace and easy loving, Joe’s shout is jarring, like nails on a blackboard. It startles Nicky, who was reading with his head pillowed in Joe’s lap. When Joe throws the remote of the TV at the screen with another shout, Nicky sits up suddenly and runs a soothing hand through Joe’s beard. 

“They’ll never learn, will they?” Joe spits, pointing at the TV. “One step forward, two steps back?” 

When he finally looks away from Joe’s face to see what plays on the screen, Nicky finds that Andy and Nile have crowded onto the sofa, weapons in hand. The news is on, and sure enough, they show people protesting with flags of blue, white and pink, streets crowded with people galvanised by the idea of removing the hard-earned rights of a whole community.

“La Manif Pour Tous? Bande de connards,” Andy snarls by their side, and Joe grunts in agreement. Nicky’s hand has started twitching in anger where it rests on Joe’s thigh. He’d meant for it to be comforting, but he’s too irritated himself for it to be efficient in any way now.

“What are they protesting?” Nile asks, confused. They’ve started teaching her some French, for hers is a little rusty, along with notions of Italian and Arabic, but she’s nowhere near fluency yet. 

“Gay marriage. It finally became legal in France in 2013,” Nicky starts to explain.

“And these assholes are trying to repeal this right,” Joe says, finishing for Nicky. Joe is typically fond of sarcasm and snark; he rarely resorts to name-calling, but humanity’s determination to destroy the few good things it came up with has always frustrated him to no end. He’s also seen and experienced the awful treatments men and women like him and Nicky have suffered throughout the ages. To think that after so long, after a whole millennium, this small yet significant progress could be for naught…

There is a beat of silence as the four of them take in the images on the screen: the pitiful signs and flags, the proud declaration of bigotry, ignorance and small-mindedness. It is Nile who speaks up first.

“Did you marry when it was made legal?”

Joe and Andy snort while Nicky smiles warmly, just this side of patronising; it is the sort of smile a parent gives their child after a particularly naive yet endearing question.

“As if I’d wait for it to be legal to claim this man as mine in the eyes of the world and of the unknown,” Joe says with a smirk that morphs into a loving, almost dopey grin when he turns his gaze towards Nicky. They are both careful with their words when it comes to religion. Both of them were raised pious, taught to love God or Allah and defend Him against the Infidels or the Invaders. Finding out that amongst the enemy was half of your soul, the most luminous part of your heart and the very best person to have walked this Earth has long shaken their beliefs in much, including in God. Their newfound immortality hasn’t helped either. 

Nile frowns at this statement and makes a mental note to ask them about their faiths or apparent lack thereof to clear up any confusion. Nothing they say indicates that the beliefs that brought them together remain, but she is observant, trained to pay attention to details, and she’s noticed them mumbling under their breath each night. When they’re all wrapped up in each other, drifting off to sleep, they  _ always _ whisper words that Nile has never been able to catch, but assumed was a prayer.

“We’ve been married for a very long time,” Nicky explains, reaching out for Joe’s hand to entwine his fingers with his.

“And many times, too.”

“And none legally, somehow.” Andy laughs; she’d been surprised that they hadn’t rushed to forge Dutch passports to get legally married as soon as 2001. They would have been convincing too, because Joe’s Dutch is excellent and Nicky looks too damn gentle for anyone to suspect him—a common and deadly mistake.

“Signing our names at a Town Hall isn’t exactly the best way to remain under the radar, boss,” Nicky points out as Joe nods by his side. It’s a conversation they’ve had many times. Andy very much agrees with them, but she enjoys teasing them all the same.

“So, how did you get married? I don’t assume you did it religiously, back then?” Nile asks, as intrigued as she is confused.

“As anyone would: we made vows to one another.”

“Sometimes with witnesses, sometimes without,” Nicky completes Joe’s statement with a nod. He doesn’t need to glance to his side to know that Joe looks pleased to no end at their natural symbiosis, but he turns anyway because there is little he loves more than watching his lover, all satisfied and starry-eyed.

On the TV, the images have changed in favour of a segment on the varieties of algae that can be found on the coast of Brittany, which somehow manages to be much more palatable than any coverage of the protests ever could. Joe still stares at the screen, but his eyes are far and unseeing; he’s reminiscing, if his ever-growing smirk and misty eyes are anything to go by.

“Will you tell me about your weddings?” Nile says, ever curious. Her thirst for knowledge never seems to abate, no matter the topic, which delights Joe to no end; he’s a natural teacher and a curious and fast learner himself. He’s also glad to share memories. It’s been a long time since he’s been able to tell the tales of the Old Guard, and though it hasn’t been long since he’s last talked at length about his Nicky and their love—this very morning over breakfast, actually—both are worth epics and ballads sung in their names, so he’ll seize any opportunity he has.

“Please, spare us a few,” Andy says with a knowing glint in her eyes that Nile only understands when Joe and Nicky exchange a glance and a smirk.

“You didn’t!” Nile guffaws.

It is Nicky who answers. “We’re multitaskers. I can make a vow and do other things at the same time.”

“Or be done, in this case,” Joe points out with a chuckle and a nudge of his hip to Nicky’s. His hand leaves Nicky’s reluctantly, but he soothes the sting of separation by quickly wrapping his arm around Nicky’s shoulders, tucking him into his side closer, ever closer.

“Just so,” Nicky agrees, nodding, equanimous. 

Joe raises a brow, waiting for the quip and the groaned “ _ too much information _ ” that should come from Booker or Andy; his face falls when he is met with silence. They still find themselves surprised when Booker’s drawl doesn’t come when they all know it should. They can almost hear him and, were his betrayal and exile not still so raw and sore, they might even bet on it, venture guesses as to what exactly he would have said. They all flinch for a second, even Joe, who may still feel the rage he always feels when someone hurts Nicky, but also misses his brother. Andy, too, is somewhat quieter than usual. It’s practically impossible to spot, or it would be, had Joe and Nicky not known her for centuries now, but her teasing is gentler. Her mortality hangs heavy over them, and Andy now seems to make an effort to take in the scenes unfolding before her, to burn them in her mind, just in case.

“Okay, so not those weddings. The others?”

“We’ve had twenty-seven ceremonies so far,” Joe says proudly. 

Nile does the maths quickly. “So, one every thirty or forty years?” 

“Roughly, yes.” 

“Except when they get in a crazy honeymoon phase,” Andy says.

“Because they aren’t now?” 

Andy snorts and Joe beams happily at Nicky who butts his head gently against his husband’s dark curls. They are both unapologetic of their love. Even when they were somewhat aware of Booker’s jealousy and grief, they refused to tone it down: selfish as it may seem, they refuse to dishonour their lover by pretending to be any less proud of them than they are.

“Believe it or not, it can be much worse,” Andy starts. “Around the end of the 19th century, they got into a phase. They got married three times in the span of two years.”

“Great time, that,” Nicky says with a grin that mirrors Joe’s perfectly.

“ _ Great _ ,” Joe repeats.

They don’t need much prodding after that. Joe never does, so he launches happily into a retelling of these three ceremonies, of their weddings in Genoa, in Greece and in Alexandria—though he holds back on the story of their feverish honeymoon in Malta, of the weeks they spent making love under the sun and under the stars. Andy and Booker had attended all three, as had a few mortal friends they’d made back then. Andy had been glad to—she’d missed the last one and had never quite known how it had been. She asks about it, sure Joe and Nicky will remember it. Their memories might be fading, faces and names of their seemingly mortal lives burnt out, like smoke lingering around a candle that’s been snuffed out, but Joe and Nicky never forget a thing as long as the other is by their side—”he’s unforgettable, boss,” Nicky had explained with a shrug.

“How was it, the one before Genoa? You never did tell me.”

Nicky smiles warmly—not that he’s stopped since they’ve started reminiscing. “It was here.”

“Here?” Nile asks. “In Roscanvel?”

“The very same.”

“We spent three years, here, waiting for the revolution. You were in Paris, Andy, getting a front row seat, and we were waiting for your orders,” Joe says.

“It was lovely.” 

“Your Breton never got any good,” Joe teases.

“No it didn’t, I never got it,” Nicky says sheepishly. “I’m lucky they speak French in this area, now.”

Joe returns his attention to Nile who listens, fascinated. Stories of their pasts baffle her and scare her; she’ll be like them one day, recalling her life from centuries ago. She also never fails to feel like a child, listening to a wild bedtime story she isn’t sure she should believe in.

“It was a beautiful ceremony. We married on the cliffs we took you to the other day. It was just the two of us, we exchanged our vows and had a swim.”

“The water was  _ freezing _ ,” Nicky says, eyes far away like Joe’s had been earlier.

“Yeah, we froze our bollocks off, but it was a good day.”

“It explains why you like it here so much,” Nile ventures.

Nicky nods. “One of our best ceremonies.” 

“But not the best,” Andy says, eyebrows arched in mirth.

“Ah,” Joe hums, amused. “Leonardo sure made that one interesting.”

Nicky and Andy laugh, immediately launching into a loud and fast burst of Italian, rather unusual for Andy who typically leaves the language for Nicky and Joe. They treasure their mother tongues as a part of their relationship, a symbol of the things they’ve overcome, the barriers they’ve brought down.

“Wait, who’s Leonardo?” Nile asks. When the other three stare at her in silence, her mouth opens in shock. “No… da Vinci? Leonardo da Vinci? He was at one of your weddings? You’re fucking with me.”

“Not at all; he was a good friend.”

“I refuse to believe you knew Leonardo da Vinci,” she insists.

“And that’s your right,” Nicky says, peaceably. “I’m pretty sure we still have a few of his letters, though.”

“And some drawings,” Joe says. “They’re in our safe house in Istanbul.”

Nile gapes for a while, then for a while longer when the other three start bringing up various moments of that day and of the celebrations that had lasted well into the small hours of the following morning, loud and merry. Most of the guests hadn’t even known what they were celebrating, but they’d done so with great enthusiasm.

Recollections don’t stop after that. They flow naturally from both Joe and Nicky, helped along by Andy’s own version of the stories they tell. They’re rambunctious, almost, for the memories are happier than the times they’ve been navigating recently. Their joyfulness and the sheer romanticism of their repetitive weddings eclipse almost entirely Booker’s absence and the awful protests going on, if only for a little while. Until inevitably, Nile asks during a sudden lull in the conversation:

“You didn’t tell me about the first one. How was it?”

“It’s getting late, we should get dinner ready,” Nicky says, standing up with a parting pat on Joe’s thigh. Joe gives an unhappy hum when the warm weight of Nicky leaves his side, but he doesn’t try to stop him. In fact, he gives him a knowing smile and picks up the book Nicky had abandoned after Joe’s angry shout, flicking through it in an obvious attempt at dropping the topic.

This is a wordless but definite dismissal, and Nile doesn’t insist, though her mind keeps turning, curiosity tingling at the bottom of her stomach. She knows that there is nothing to obtain that they haven’t decided to share. 

Nicky and Joe never talk about their very first wedding.  _ Never _ . In all the centuries Andy has known them, she’s never once managed to get more than weighty looks between the two and a “it was a long time ago”. That had earned them a scoff from Andy—as if she, of all people, didn’t understand the significance of time that passes and things that never change.

Still, they hadn’t let on anything then, they haven’t since and they never will. They’ve had many ceremonies in their lifetime, and undoubtedly will have more. They’ve had all sorts of people in attendance, some known and sympathetic guests, some bystanders, there by chance, and sometimes it was just the two of them, made invisible by the bustling life around them. Their first wedding, however, was theirs and theirs only.

They’d been what had felt alone in the world. Two short decades after their first death, long before they’d met Andy, they had abandoned their home and past life, and they’d only had each other. They’d crossed the Sahara desert in what is now Tunisia, and there, they were  _ alone _ ; any soul in their place would have felt lonely. And yet, with Niccolò there, Yusuf had felt the desert full of life; with Yusuf by his side, Niccolò had felt the strength of an army behind him.

They’d set camp one night, on the sand and under the stars, so bright and numerous, though they always were, back then. After a meagre meal that they’d shared, Yusuf had knelt in front of Niccolò like a man praying, and he’d told him in one single breath yet in all the languages he’d known that he was Niccolò’s, ever would be. He’d offered himself entirely, and he’d begged Niccolò to be his. Niccolò had knelt too, had climbed into Yusuf’s lap, had breathed his air from Yusuf’s mouth, ran his hands everywhere he might reach, and where he couldn’t, too. The desert had seemed so very loud with Yusuf’s vows, his promises, whispered in Niccolò’s ear in Ligurian, so low for fear that someone might hear them. No one could have heard them; they were alone amidst the sand, alone in the entire world, just the two of them in existence. Niccolò, with sweat beading at his forehead, with the strain in his knees and the burning of his thighs, had answered in kind. He’d promised all that he’d had: himself, and his love for Yusuf, all in a broken Arabic that Yusuf hadn’t had the strength to poke fun at, hips busy thrusting up in passion, head bowing down in reverence.

They’d considered themselves married after that night, though they hardly could introduce themselves as husbands. Still, they’d promised each other a lifetime of love, however long that may be. They’d had the stars as witnesses and the moon as officiant, and that was more than most could claim for themselves. 

Such a private affair it was, they would not desecrate that night in front of anyone, not even for Andy who had been by their sides for centuries, or Nile, who would be long after Andy was gone.

Dinner is a good-humoured business. Nicky is praised for his cooking and Nile shares stories of her childhood—those have been getting easier for her and talking about her family seems to oddly help, for now, as if she needs to let it all out in order to move on. They ask questions about her siblings, her parents, their own wedding, until Nile stops.

“I’d like to attend one of your weddings,” she says slowly.

“You will,” Nicky says at the exact same time Joe answers:

“You already have.”

“What?”

“Joe…” Nicky warns. Joe has always been more outspoken about their love, and generally less secretive. In the end, Nicky is easily convinced to talk about their bond, if only to watch Joe’s proud, happy smile on his face, but this he won’t compromise for anything.

“Alright, never mind,” Joe says, raising his hands in surrender, though he never would have expanded on it either way. 

This is another thing they won’t tell anyone, for it is entwined too tightly with their first wedding. When they declare having had twenty-seven ceremonies thus far, Nicky and Joe aren’t exactly lying; any assumption one might make is hardly their responsibility. Their language is deliberate, their choice of words precise. They  _ have _ indeed held twenty-seven wedding ceremonies, solemn little things, proper events, alone on cliffs in Brittany or in a crowded mansion in Florence. Counting the number of times they have been wed, however, amounts to counting the days since that night in the Tunisian desert. Nile hasn’t understood yet what their evening prayer truly is, which she can’t be blamed for, since Andy or Booker haven’t either, and neither Joe nor Nicky wish to enlighten any of them.

Every single night, wrapped against Nicky’s back, Joe tucks his face against Nicky’s neck and whispers—barely audible, low enough that only Nicky can hear—the promises he makes in Ligurian, vows of love that transcends what they were taught to be, that will endure centuries, millennia. And every single night, Nicky takes Joe’s hand delicately in his, cradles it to his mouth and kisses it before breathing out the promise of everything he is, Niccolò and Yusuf’s, all murmured word for word, the many mistakes he now spots in his Arabic, preserved and precious. 

Every single night, with the stars as witnesses and the moon as officiant, they come together once more and vow to do so again and again and again.

Nicky smiles at Nile, who is still staring at him expectantly, then at Andy, who must have guessed where this is going if her grateful yet wobbly grin is anything to go by. One last chance to be part of the celebration of the holiest love she’s ever seen, except perhaps for the one she felt herself for centuries, so long ago.

“I think,” Nicky starts, leaning against Joe—when his body gravitated towards him again, he doesn’t know, some time about a millennium ago, surely— “that we’re due to a new ceremony soon, if you want.” 

“I know a great cliff to get married on,” Joe agrees, grinning. “Anyone fancy a swim?”

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Short note on La Manif Pour Tous which I mentioned in the fic —and that's already way more than these assholes deserve, yikes. It _is_ , indeed, and very sadly, a thing. These guys protest all the good shit you can imagine (same-sex marriage, the right for adoption or use of surrogates for same-sex couples....) AND had the _NERVE_ to name their shit-show of a movement after the protests that were led in FAVOUR of same-sex marriage. These were called Le Mariage Pour Tous (=marriage for all) and these vile fucknuggets named their movement La Manif Pour Tous (=protest for all), which is, as you can see, extremely despicable. ANYWAY that's all on them. If you ever visit France and see one of these protests going on, please make sure to trip a couple of the protesters :)))))) 
> 
>   
> EDIT: this fic became a series! I decided to write the wedding "ceremonies". I'll post them as I write them, so they won't be in chronological order. Hope you enjoy it!
> 
> As always, don't forget to tip your fic writers in kudos and comments if you've enjoyed their stuff! It takes a second and it makes their day! Thanks a lot for reading!
> 
> You can find me on [Tumblr](https://brie-on-bread.tumblr.com)!


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